On Wednesday, Donald Trump, the master manipulator and “line crossing” provocateur went too far. Has he literally ruined America? Maybe not yet, but what he did today starts that process.
He took a major step over the line of decency towards doing so. I mean this in a way that is greater than all of his misogyny and racism previously. Today he went further.
I admit, I was blurry when I first saw the news. It was just before 6am, and my smartphone beeped with a notice of the morning headline. It stated that Donald Trump had proclaimed a ban of transgender people from serving in the military. I blinked my eyes. Surely, this was a gag, “fake news”, an alarmist Alt-Left site exaggerated the already outlandish behavior of a reality TV star gone wild.
It was the Washington Post. Worse, the news was true.
I have become somewhat jaded with the Trump shock and awe technique. As an American, I am embarrassed about almost everything the man has done while in office. I expect him to do unprofessional, undignified, offensive and generally unproductive things. It has become part of the territory.
This time, his wound went deep. At first, I thought my reactive anger and hurt was due to the fact that I have many transgender friends, and consider each one of them to be a personal hero to me.
My reaction was about more than that however. It was about America being ruined.
The United States was founded on a set of principles. Those principles embraced the realization that all are equal, and should be treated so in the rights they have as human beings in our society. While we were founded on these ideals, those ideals were short on realization, especially at first. Women were not included, non-landowners, black people, immigrants, etc. were all left out. Over two hundred years we grew and progressed, evolved and have been correcting those mistakes, if not in full actualization at least in intention. One of the most recent achievements towards our becoming the best of our ideals was the achievement that LGBTQ people had the right to serve in the military and to marry.
Now, Donald Trump has sent the nation into a state of regression. He is removing rights. By declaring that transgender people could not serve in the military, he trampled the dignity, aspirations, hopes, and life plans of 15000 Americans who had committed and were serving our country.
Donald Trump has started the process of enshrining the principle of “all are not created equal”. While he has started with transgender people, we can only speculate as to who else on his target list will have basic rights stripped away.
The destruction of America has begun. But not without a letter from me:
Dear Donald,
I think you have been berated for your Transphobic actions already today by much of the American public. Many have pointed out your lack of class in stripping a target population of their rights on the anniversary of Harry Truman giving another besieged population an affirmation of their dignity as citizens.
It has been pointed out already that you, a five time draft deferment entitlement child, have attacked some of the bravest among us, while you held onto your own timidity in serving in the military yourself to instead, only serving yourself.
I am also not going to point out that the money you claim to be saving in transgender medical costs would be nullified significantly if you gave up golf, and your wife had moved into the White House when she was supposed to.
Instead, I want to tell you about an interaction I had with my dad, a retired Lt. Colonel in the US Marine Corp.
I was 24 years old and he had just been informed, not by me, that I, his only son and namesake, was gay.
The conversation we had was the worst of my entire life. He told me that while I was his son, and always would be, he loathed what I was. He did not know if he could accept it, and he hated it.
It was all I had feared of his reaction to the revelation of who I really was. I sat and listening to his rant, feeling small, humiliated, the supreme disappointment to him.
Finally he said, “You know. I sat on many a panel in the military judging homosexual men and voting to have them thrown out of the military.”
With that confession, I found my voice. “That is horrible dad. You were part of ruining their lives. And they were just men like me.”
As I said that, the look in his eyes changed. The anger, the hurt, the disappointment left his face. He had the realization that I had turned into the karma he had dreaded. I was, at that moment, payback for an injustice he had been part of that he did not feel good about. His son was the type of man he had judged before, and I was not going anywhere. He would have to face me the rest of his life.
The look in his eyes was now one of shame.
It ended our conversation that night and we never, ever discussed my homosexuality again. Over the following decades he grew to tolerate who I was, then to accept it, and then finally to celebrate it in ways big and small.
He grew, because he had something you seem to lack, Mr. Trump. A conscience.
As I said, you crossed a line… and there may be no return for you. A conscience at this point, might be horrifically painful for you should you find it.
My dad had to overcome the guilt of trampling the lives of half a dozen men, and he over came it with love extended to one…. Me.
If you were to feel shame, yours would be much larger. By fifteen thousand fold.
I was my dad’s karma. I do not know who will be yours. I just know it is coming.
I am glad I am not you. I am glad you are not my father, and I wish you were not my President.
He is a hero, military and otherwise. The men and women you are threatening to discharge are heroes, militarily and otherwise.
You , Mr. Trump, are not a hero. You have no worth.
You are simply the snake oil salesman who sold out America’s principles.
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Hmm
Now that transgender people can no longer serve in my military that is the greatest news in ever told since the dark cloud that came onto the United States of America.
In truth as of today transgender people or even an LGBTQ person has never even come up with any cite[s] to even back up their phony claim that a human being is born in the wrong body.
This has never been done.
He said she said does not work for me, for that is no proof. A theory is no proof, for a theory is a lie that cannot be back up with a cite[s].
The economy will do much better without any transgender people in my military. This is because taxpayers such never ever pay for so phony idea of surgery, or treatment that a transgender person needs for the rest of their life. I say if you want to claim to be a transgender then You and You alone should pay for that, for that is your choice and you made the choice and not us taxpayers.
You transgender and LGBTQ made your phony choice and you have made demands that we that are taxpayers to pay for you to be wrong. You even claim that the people of the United States of America be tolerant and have diversity to your phony idea of being transgender. WRONG.
No Cite[s] mean you have nothing and you should not get anything at all.
No cite[s] mean you are not and should never be allowed in my United States Military in order to be taxpayers to pay for your free ride.
Okay I happen to know for a fact you that are LGBTQ and transgender can be court-martial for even alternating government property, and many other military laws, for you fail to tell the truth of your gender of your birth.
In truth you should be court-martial for lying under oath, for you all and each and every transgender LGBTQ is a bold face liar.
In truth you transgender and LGBTQ people are and always been trouble from the beginning because of your bold face lies.
Why be tolerant to a liar like all you LGBTQ and transgender people are. See that there is no way to be tolerant to bold face lair and there is no way to even have diversity to a bold face liar like the LGBTQ and transgender people.
The other thing is why should the United States of America’s Military fight for your communist/socialist type of thinking, for all and I mean all transgender and LGBTQ love and are all communist/socialist, for they love Communism/Socialism so much that they love to use words that say demand, mandatory, force, mandate, and they love the word entitlement big government government control. They hate freedom and liberty so much they even say that everyone must use word of being politically correctness. and waterdown words and the meaning of words. They even hate freedom of religion, They hate freedom so much that they are saying it is a hate crime just to say anything that they do not like.
Transgender LGBTQ just leave my Military and leave the United states of America and move to North Korea where you belong or china, Cuba, These are communist nations. or even go to a Muslim nation.
Thank You
My dad did not put his life on the line serving our country to defend bigotry like yours. This is not YOUR Military or YOUR United States. Your enormous self centered ego is going to have to share, along with the rest of us. Physical and mental health experts have studies and “cited” the transgender experience many times over. That you are ignorant of that is no one’s problem but your own. So, please, for the sake of us all…. get over yourself and for God’s sake, take a class in grammar… and spelling.
I served in the United States Marine Corps
One thing where is your cite[s] yo prove what you are saying has any merit to your claim about the phony transgender is even real. So far there is no physical or mental health expert that can even back up your claim of transgender, and they will never even prove one thing. It is not bigotry or any of those other things you say is the problem it is the lies that the lairs say and the he said she said that you that are liberals that have no merit to what you are saying.
By the way I will continual to write and say what I am saying and there is no one thing anyone can do about it at all. Not even you. I will even go on to even say more about the LGBTQ people and their so sick way of living and how this so very sick way of life is hate and all of them are haters of life.
Yes keep all transgender and LGBTQ out of my Military. By the way you are born with the gender that you are to be at birth not what you feel like that is not proof.
Yes all LGBTQ and transgender are all perverts and like to pervert society in their liberal way of thinking. They have perverted the way public schools are teaching. They love to say boys should be allowed to wear a dress or skirt or any other clothing that is meant for girls. Now that is sick to see a boy dressed like a girl.
Face the other fact it cost money to give to the transgender and LGBTQ to fix their silly little problems of identity. That money can be used to buy bullets that the military needs.
I also feel why should we waist our good earned tax dollars to pay for a silly thing like healthcare in order to support the sick minded transgender and the so very sick minded LGBTQ. Let them pay for their own healthcare.
You see what you are saying to me comes from the communist/socialist liberal democrat worldview.
I also know this.
You must like to raise taxes and you must like to listen to the lies that come from the liberals and the phony LGBTQ and transgender people.
I did my research so where is yours? You most likely have none.
Thank You
nice article
It LIVE
http://leapaudio.org/a-gay-dad-sounds-off-on-the-day-donald-trump-ruined-america-by-rob-watson/
Thank you so much for this Mark!
I really want to understand what you are trying to say here. Yet, no matter what I feel for you as a person with free speech, I cannot for get that i have children who have to grow up in this country. Although you and some LBGT friends may feel that your lifestyle is just fine and all around need to adjust accordingly, I don’t know if you really get the idea that it is not natural for men to be with men or women with women.. anyone who is trained in social work and mental health as i am knows that until recently both the gay lifestyle and any other then man and woman was listed formally as a psychological disorder. Your lifestyle may have worked its way into your children’s or friends mindset as being “normal “- but for most kids who have to witness these lifestyles it can be very traumatic and cause lots of problems.
Before you get too worked up and call people like me bigots or whatever the latest term is, consider that just a few years ago people living the LGBT lifestyle would have been medicated and hospitalized in some cases. There is a reason for that- your lifestyle has the highest domestic violence, substance abuse, and suicide rate by 5x over any heterosexual relationships. The average gay man has had 500+ sex partners and the transgender friends you are so ” proud ” of – have a current suicide rate of 61%…. Those are not healthy numbers for anyone. I would not encourage anyone I care about to pursue that type of lifestyle …so be sure that you are on the right track when you say Trump hates all LGBT or gays. Its not the people anyone hates, its the outcomes of that world.
Thanks for sharing your point of view. In my opinion, in my experience, and in a deep education on every point you raised— your logic is tragically flawed. All the major respected and peer reviewed mental health experts and organizations do not view homosexuality or being transgender to be a condition or illness. To quote you, “there is a reason for that”. The bulk or your argument lies in the reliance of a previous ignorant “science” that was in no way tested as the current methods have been, and to trust those previous concepts even though they were based on poor assumptions, prejudices and a sociological agenda — not real people. You also ignore the horrific results that those who were subjected to those previous theories experienced.
Your second premise is the statistics you ascribe around people who are LGBT. That is the most ironic part of your argument. You want to pretend that those numbers, some of which are accurate, are the result of peoples’ innate beings. They are not. They are from having to live daily with people who hold the opinions you do (and thankfully, you are now in a minority, and not the majority as in years past) and the constant abuse and oppression YOUR OPINIONS and your subsequent behaviors inflict on people. Those numbers, the increased suicides, the increased depressions, they are not seen in LGBT people who grow up in supportive environments (this has been documented), they occur in environments when LGBT people are subjected to people of your opinions.
Please note… I did not ascribe the word “hate” to Trump. I did not ascribe the word “bigot” to you. You made those identifications. They, like your opinions, which I find horribly, terribly ignorant of facts or reality, are your responsibility to either own… or change.
That’s all right, Rob. You don’t have to call this compassionate probably-a-Christian a bigot. I did it for you.
My first thought… where’s Ben? Thanks for showing up, always great to read your points!
I check in every once in a while, but you don’t seem to be writing much. I’m always happy to contribute.
The reason conversion therapy is starting to be banned in several jurisdictions across the country is more than just because LGBT say it should be. It’s because it has been demonstrated that such “therapies” can inflict lasting psychological harm. Perhaps you are a well-qualified social and mental health worker, but I hope no LGBT person has trusted you with their care, if you believe homosexuality to be an illness. If you’re as interested in understanding what Rob is trying to say–which, by my lights, he has said beautifully and eloquently–may I respectfully suggest you study the current science on human sexuality? And while you’re at it, check those statistics again. An LGBT “lifestyle” has the “highest domestic violence, substance abuse, and suicide rate by 5x over any heterosexual relationships”: That is just dead wrong, and smacks of a cherry-picked study to suit your wrongheaded view. For the sake of the children you are raising in 21st-century America, for the sake of your clients, and for your own sake, I highly recommend you bring yourself up to date on the science and psychology of which you speak. Sadly, you are way behind the times, and that will do no one in your world a whit of good.
Thanks so much for weighing in Rachel! Great points.
Wow. you don’t want to be called a bigot, but then, you state a whole bunch of stuff which is frankly as bigoted as you can get– without a pitchfork and a torch.
Honey, it’s not a lifestyle, it’s a life. You ignore what millennia of oppression have done to gay people. You do everything in your power to discourage relationships, and then act surprised when gay men are promiscuous. You do whatever you can to encourage psychological problems, and then act surprised that we have them.
except that we don’t. I’ve known very few gay people in my life that are in the pits that you wish to throw us all into. I myself am 67, and I still run 6 minute miles. So how unhealthy am I?
It amazes me how so many gay people I have known have maintained their relationships for anywhere from 15 years (us) go 65 years, despite all of the efforts of BIGOTS– yes indeed, I will use that word– to tear those relationships apart. It likewise amazes me how difficult a time heterosexuals have in maintaining their relationships– 25-33% adultery rates, 40-50% divorce rates, 40-70% of children being raised out of wedlock– despite all of the social forces arrayed to keep them together.
Consider if you will that there was a point in history where “female hysteria” was also considered a mental disorder, or that promiscuous women were also locked into institutions and medicated. The good thing about science is that it evolves, and readily accepts when ideas–like that homosexuality or transgender people are mentally ill–are proven wrong.
Imagine if you can that if you taught your children that transgender people are just people who deserve the same respect that everyone does, you could help stop the discrimination that these people face. I know and love some transgender people; I have raised two amazing bisexual children. I know that they are just as “normal” as their cisgender and heterosexual counterparts. I hope for your sake, and the sake of our brothers and sisters in the LGBTQ community, that you can open your heart and your mind to accept others who may be different from you.
Touche. Thanks Erin. Brilliant.
Reblogged this on Mavadelo's mindscape and commented:
I am not blogging much nowadays but this is an important time. Not only LGBT need to stand up and voice, also allies need to step up. I hope I still have enough followers . Check below story and reblog/share. RESIST
Reblogged this on It Is What It Is and commented:
There are no words needed … all have been written in this post. Yes, this wound was deep in my psyche too. The ‘proverbial line’ was crossed!
#NotMyPresident …
Rob another excellent, and very kind letter, to a poor excuse for a being on this earth. He chose to be the way he is, and yes, Karma will someday greet him unexpectedly. Always appreciate your letters. ChloeAlexa.